“I was expecting a standing start,” Alex Albon was taken aback by a rolling restart in Monaco
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Alex Albon
Last weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix was delayed by over an hour due to rain and extremely wet conditions. When it was to start, the stewards opted to use a rolling start – behind a safety car. However, by the 20th lap, the rain had been long gone, and the teams were quick to switch to slick tires.
On lap 27, Mick Schumacher went a few centimeters wide at turn 14, which led to him losing control of his car and going into the barriers at the entrance to the swimming pool chicane. This split his car into two. This brought out a virtual safety car, and eventually, the session was red-flagged because the barriers needed to be repaired.
When the session was restarted, the stewards also decided to do a rolling start behind a safety car than a normal, standing start, where the cars would start on the grid. This is the decision that Alex Albon has questioned, even though he accepts that the first time around the track was too wet for a standing start. He was also perplexed by the initial delay due to the rain.
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Albon: ‘I was expecting a standing start [on the slick tires].’
Alex Albon accepted that the track was too wet for a standing start when they actually decided to start, but felt they should have started earlier: “I reckon we could have gone straight away. Obviously, we took the delay and that is when the weather hit us.”
Indeed, the rain had been rather tame at the originally scheduled time but picked up in intensity over time. For the red-flag period, Albon felt that the rolling start was unnecessary and had compromised his race. Before Mick Schumacher’s accident, all of the grid was already on slick tires.
On the restart, Albon stated: “I was expecting a standing start. Normally we take standing starts now but we opted for rolling starts. On the slick tire, that was the most surprising.”
Albon had been a lap down before the restart, and he was allowed to un-lap himself during the rolling start but he was unable to catch up with the tail-end of the field and as such, he was unable to take advantage of any potential opportunities.
“I thought that should have definitely been a standing start because, for me, it ruined my race. I was 30 seconds back from everyone else by the time I got through the traffic. I’m sure we will have a discussion about it at the next race.”
Earlier, Alex Albon had been involved in an unlapping scuffle with Charles Leclerc. The Williams’ driver went through more than a dozen blue flags before Leclerc was finally able to pass due to a lock-up on Albon’s side at turn 1, Sainte-Devote. Ferrari and Charles Leclerc were certainly not pleased by that and felt that Albon had compromised the Monegasque’s race. Something similar happened with Albon’s teammate Nicholas Latifi and Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz.
Albon was also forced to retire on lap 48 due to a mechanical issue. The Thai driver would be hoping to shrug off a weekend to forget in Monaco and to attain a stronger result in the upcoming race at Baku.
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